H6 plan.

[exxos]

I have started working on changes to produce a H6 board now.. I want to produce a board which has "more stuff" and future proof it a bit more. This will of course take some months to complete.

So the current changes are:

1) Add a Audio jack on the rear.
2) Add pads for the RS232 to USB serial module
3) Create 3 variations on 3.3V addon board sizes. 50% larger than 68K and twice the size,to allow more complex addons on a single board.
4) Add a FPGA onboard to allow blitter,glue,mmu to use the suska FPGA cores (The original ST chipset sockets will not be removed)

The FPGA cores will take a lot of time to make cycle accurate. @Icky has made the most cycle accurate blitter core to date. The MMU & GLUE may take some more time as the wakeup states need to be diagnosed properly to allow a typical power up of WS2. We tried to do this with FPGA addon boards on a STFM, but working on original hardware is just a PITA! So I have worked out I will need several more IO buffers to allow interfacing all the extra signals to the FPGA chip.

We know the suska cores work overall. So even if they are not totally cycle accurate, its good enough to do dev work on. Plus as the MMU & GLUE are replaced, it opens the door to a true 32MHz system! OTOH, A faster system will break timings anyway, meaning the wakeup state issue becomes irrelevant anyway.

Though I hope once we get the cores running on CPU & RAM can run at 32MHz and with our FPGA shifter by @Smonson , we are already ready for higher resolutions and colours. We just need faster RAM, and the suska cores in FPGA opens up this door!

[PhilC]

Sounds good to me @exxos , I best get my LA up and working this week then :lol:

And happy as usual to back your projects :D

[olivier.jan]

Sounds good! I’ll definitely be in for the H6 too.
Just one thing : could you revert to a dip version of MFP or make it a through hole socket for the PLCC?
I guess the FPGA version of the GLUE will be able to directly decode TOS ?

[exxos]

The plcc socket is already a through hole part..

[JezC]

Sounds like another great idea - will you be thinking of including some options to help avoid the current issues with the availability of some of the SMT parts from the PCB houses?
Or are you pretty sure you will go for a more expensive assembly options & avoid these shortages from specific PCB manufacturers?

I'm just aware that you are having lots of valuable time taken up with trying to get round these shortages...

[exxos]

@JezC I'm still looking at every possible option https://www.exxosforum.co.uk/forum/viewt ... 013#p59165

[olivier.jan]

The plcc socket is already a through hole part..

Yes, my bad, seems you changed it already on B1.

[JezC]

@JezC I'm still looking at every possible option https://www.exxosforum.co.uk/forum/viewt ... 013#p59165

@exxos - yes, I read that..very frustrating! That's partly why I was wondering if it was an option to design in flexibility (DIP/SMT dual footprints for example) for at least some of the parts... :shrug:

Not easy to do in many cases I agree but we need to try & find ways to minimise wasting your time to work on the new & interesting stuff rather than rehashing the existing board layouts to address these shortages/the whim of the assembly houses.

We're having lots of similar (and worse!) problems at work due to this global semiconductor shortage...and some are predicting it will last throughout the rest of the year :cry:

[sporniket]

Sounds good to me.

[DoG]

Is anyone using the full 25 pin serial port for anything now a days? Could we make it 9 pin and put it to either ends and get the space that is left over for switches/outlets? Or has that already been considered?